


Illusory Reality

by sixbeforelunch



Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Episode Related, F/M, internalized ableism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-04-18 01:54:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14202495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sixbeforelunch/pseuds/sixbeforelunch
Summary: Number One and Pike navigate shifting layers of illusion, reality, and each other.





	Illusory Reality

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DesertVixen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesertVixen/gifts).



> I've never written Number One or Pike before. Since we have so little to go on for both of them, I pulled from Memory Beta, specifically the novel _Vulcan's Glory_ by DC Fontana.
> 
> Thanks to tigerbright for help with getting this story written and for the quick beta.

"Are you happy?"

Pike swirled his whiskey. The ice clinked against the glass. He frowned, as if not entirely sure he understood the question. He looked as he had nearly sixteen years ago, when Number One had first come aboard the _Enterprise_ as his new first officer. It was telling that they could be anywhere, and yet he had placed them in the bar on old Starbase 6, with _Enterprise_ herself visible through the window.

"Happier than I would be anywhere else," Pike said slowly. He grimaced. "All things considered." He looked out at his old ship and then back at her. "So Starfleet lifted the ban," he said. It was a deliberate change of subject.

"It was pointless not to," Number One said. "If the Talosians could use their powers at such a distance, could place an illusory Commodore Mendez in Kirk's mind as far out as Starbase 11...there's no telling the limits of their ability. The system is still restricted, but the draconian measures are gone."

He smiled. "How many people did you have to bother to get permission to come?"

"Plenty," Number One said with a wry twist of her lips.

"Well. Thank you for bothering them. It's nice to be with someone...real." He squinted at her. Wondering if she was indeed real? She was about to assure him, again, that she was, but then he shrugged slightly. She supposed after all this time with the Talosians, he had accepted a certain amount of uncertainty.

"From the moment I learned what happened, I had to see you. I'm sorry it took so long."

"Maybe I'll get a few more visitors," Pike said. "Now that the Starfleet isn't threatening to kill people for coming."

"Maybe," Number One said. Not many. Death penalty or no, Talos scared people. It scared her. This shifting reality, this sense that there was no real reality, only layers of illusion... If it had been anyone else, she wouldn't have come.

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Finally, Number One asked, "How's Vina?"

"Fine." He cleared his throat. "We're not together. Romantically."

"Oh?"

"We tried. But Vina has spent her entire adult life in imaginary romances where she could change the other person on a whim. The reality of someone with their own personality...she couldn't make sense of it. She has no experience solving conflicts because she never had conflicts before, not like that." He sighed. "We're friends, after a fashion."

"I see." Number One forced down an old longing. It wasn't any more possible now than it had been before. "I'm here for two reasons. To see you, but also because Starfleet also wants an updated threat assessment. Any insights you might have would be welcome."

He drummed his fingers against the table, thinking. "The Talosians are naive," Pike said. "Or ignorant. A little of both, I think. It's not just a misunderstanding of Human nature. It's...it's the same problem that Vina has. They've lived in a fantasy world for centuries. They don't understand how to solve real-world problems. Maybe that makes them more of a threat, I don't know. I don't think it does. They aren't interested in conquering anyone." He narrowed his eyes and looked out the window. Number One suspected there were things he wasn't saying. She wondered where his loyalty lay. He was dependent on the Talosians for everything now. They could offer him things that his home never could. They could give him back his health. Or a facsimile of it, anyway.

After a minute, Pike smiled. "Vina's dating Captain Kirk. Or rather the version of him that exists in her head."

Number One choked. "Well that's...huh. How does she even know he exists?"

"The Talosians showed him to her. She found him attractive. It's...I know Kirk, and the version she's playing around with is nothing like the real thing. It's disconcerting."

Number One eyed him. "Your life is very strange."

He shrugged. "I've almost stopped noticing. Humans adapt. It's what we do."

"I suppose that's true. I've never been particularly adaptable. On Illyria things are more rigid."

"You adapted to the wider galaxy after an Illyrian upbringing. That's shows a remarkable degree of adaptation."

She stared at him for a long time, words poised on her tongue, but he spoke again before she could.

"The Talosians are right. It's addictive, their power of illusion. Total control over your experience. Any problem at all, and you can just disappear into a fantasy world. It scares me how much I like it."

A waiter wandered past and picked up his empty glass, replacing it with a full one. Number One could smell his perfume, hear the way the beads in his hair clacked against each other. It was astonishing how perfect it all was.

"Do you think that if they hadn't let us go...do you think you would have gotten comfortable here?"

He shook his head. "You know me, One. Stubborn to the end. Buy this time around, I chose this. Nuns fret not, you know?"

She shook her head. "I don't know."

"Wordsworth. 'The prison, into which we doom ourselves, no prison is.'"

"Oh. Poetry."

"Yes, poetry. Sorry to offend your Illyrian sensibilities."

"Poetry doesn't offend. It just seems pointless."

"I know." Pike's eyes went unfocused, distant. When his attention came back, he was frowning. Upset.

"What?"

He shook his head. The scene shifted, changing from the bar on Starbase 6 to something pastoral and serene. They were sitting in a lakeside pagoda. Swans paddled gently across the water. Kids were playing in the distance.

"Don't do that!" Pike shouted. For a moment, everything got fuzzy, and she saw reality. Pike in his wheelchair. The two of them seated at a metal table in an underground bunker, deep beneath a ruined world. And then they were back on Starbase 6.

"What--"

"The Keeper," Pike said, grimacing.

Number One thought it over. "Is he still trying to get you to procreate?"

Pike shook his head. "This body--" he gestured to himself "--might look hale and spry, but it's not the truth. My body, my real body, couldn't make a baby if I wanted to. The Keeper thinks that Humans shouldn't exist outside of a pair bond. I've tried explaining that everyone needs or wants a romance, but...he only knows me and Vina, and neither of us are aromantic, even if we don't quite fit together. He--nevermind."

"He told you I still have fantasies," Number One said, softly. "About you. Us."

Pike glared at the table. "He had no right to go into your head like that."

"No. But it's the truth." She sighed. "I was raised to find love, like poetry, pointless, but...we're still Human, we Illyrians. Our colony might have been founded on other principles, but we can't deny our Humanity." She paused, considered. "Some can. I've stopped trying to." She reached across the table and took his hand. It was warm and soft in hers. "I love you. I have for a long time."

Pike searched her face. His eyes were the most perfect blue, she thought idly.

"One, I--"

She shook her head. "It's fine. I never expected you to reciprocate."

"No, not that. You're an intelligent, resourceful, thoughtful person who also happens to be one of the most beautiful women I've ever laid eyes on."

Number One didn't blush. She wasn't even surprised by the flattery. She wasn't called Number One for nothing. On Illyria she had been designated the best of her breed, and false modesty had had no place in her upbringing. But hearing him say it meant...something she couldn't quite put her finger on.

All at once, the illusion dissolved again, this time completely. They were sitting in a stark room. Pike was in his wheelchair, his true face, his true infirmities, perfectly evident. She stared at him, confused, and looked around wondering if it was one of the Talosians who had done it, but it was only them.

Logic, Number One thought. You're good at that.

"Are you asking me if I can accept the reality of you, and not just the idealized illusion?"

One blink. Yes.

"Well I can. You're still you, regardless of your limitations."

"That ugly useless body! You can love that!"

Number One startled. She was seeing both the real Pike, and also an illusion of his former self. The illusion stared at the real with un-disguised loathing.

"Chris," she said softly, and that got his attention. She rarely referred to him by his given name. "I love _you_. I respect _you_. Your present appearance changes nothing." She walked to him, the real him, and reached out, but stopped before actually touching him. "Is this okay."

One blink. Interesting that he hadn't communicated via the illusion.

She touched his face, very gently.

"Do you know how long it's been since someone touched me? The real me? Except to change a bandage or put me into a sonic shower." The illusory Pike was gone, but the voice was in her head.

She bent forward to kiss him, carefully, slowly, giving him enough time to object if it wasn't what he wanted. He didn't object.

"One." They were back in the illusion now, but a different one. A comfortable sitting area, a fire, rain outside. She didn't recognize it, and wondered if it came from his memory or Vina's or the Talosian's. His arm was wrapped around hers as they reclined against the cushions. "I can't ask you to stay with me. I won't. It's not fair to you."

"I've never liked staying in one place," Number One said. "But I do like having a place to call home."

"Talos? Home?"

Number One shook her head. "You would be home."

"One..."

"We have names, you know, not just designations. On Illyria we aren't given names, but we have them. We take them for ourselves, when we're old enough to know what they mean, and we keep them to ourselves. They're a private part of us, to be given out onto to the people we trust absolutely." She touched his face. "Do you want to know my name, Chris?"

He nodded.

So she told him.

end


End file.
